Web applications that display personalized data to a user such as news headlines and stock quotes typically employ multiple web pages in order to edit the preferences for each piece of content. For example, a web site that presents the latest stock quotes and weather data will typically require the user to navigate to a separate web page in order to manage the list of stock ticker entries and weather locations. This type of customization tends to be cumbersome, hard to discover, and slow. The user has to go to the web page where the edits are to occur, understand the various options that may appear, implement the changes that are desired, save the changes, and re-acquire the original web page where the changes from the edit page are to appear. Care has to be taken to prevent the user from becoming frustrated with making changes since the edit pages can be ominous with numerous messages. Furthermore, the changes should be easily apparent, within view, and not scrolled off the updated web page.
The reverse situation is just as important. Oftentimes, when the user wants to remove an item from the web page, the user has to access the edit page, make the proper selection for removal, and re-acquire the original web page to view if the item has been removed. The user can also edit without accessing another web page to remove an item. The original web page refreshes when a selection is made to remove the item. The corresponding item no longer appears on the web page.
It is beneficial to the user to have computer software operating in a web browser that allows edits without changing to an edit page or without refreshing the web page. Various steps in the update or removal process should become transparent to the user reducing the amount of time the user has to spend on customization or setting preferences.